World Cleansing
by T3hFinalFaze
Summary: When the government fails to carry out the New World Order, an new terrorist group steps up to decide the new direction of world union. It's up to a small group of survivors to save the world from the evil clutches of a project called "World Cleansing."
1. Chapter 1

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1

Dr. Justin Hernandez removed the spectacles from his eyes. He stepped into the air-seal room and waited. The heavy iron door behind him slammed shut and a distinct whirring of machines emanated from the walls as the air-locks were activated. Small jets protruded from the walls above, next to him, and below him, and sprayed him with a disinfectant substance. It could hardly be spotted by the human eye, but once the substance touched a surface, it would instantly kill off all malicious bacteria on it.

After about thirty seconds, the jets withdrew back into the wall, their job done. The door in front of him withdrew its air-locks and opened with a creak. Hernandez stepped through and walked into the white corridor.

Hernandez couldn't feel the air in there. It was strange, just about every place in the world had a "type" of air. Parks and forests had that fresh clean air. Hospitals where known for stale, lifeless air. But the air wasn't even stale in here. It didn't feel dead, it just didn't seem to be there. Hernandez shrugged off his thoughts and refocused on the task at hand.

Hernandez was in a small corridor, about five feet wide by twenty feet long. The walls were painted a sterile white, like much of the lab Hernandez was in. The roof was only about eight feet high, and was also painted white, patterned with high-powered air filters that sucked any unhealthy particles of dust out of the air and into powerful ionizing filters. Clean air would shoot back out into the room from ports in the floor.

There was a door at the far right end of the corridor. It was constructed of very heavy-duty steel, and four humongous locks kept it secure and intact. The door led to another room which Hernandez was currently headed to. Each lock required a password, which was inputted into a small device next to the door. It was very simple; a small metallic box with a screen and a keyboard.

To Hernandez's right, the wall was fitted with a large window; about four feet long and five feet wide. The glass wasn't tinted, offering a perfect view into the room on the other side of the corridor. Because of what was inside, the window glass was four inches thick and bulletproof. Only the strongest bombs would be able to blow a hole through the sturdy glass.

Hernandez stopped and looked inside. His mind wasn't with him at the moment. He was distracted, distraught, confused. The thing inside was his doing, it was his experiment, and he knew it could go wrong any minute. Hernandez knew going into the room was dangerous, but his specimen needed to be checked and data had to be recorded. Hernandez unconsciously focused his eyes on the glass. He saw his reflection staring back at him uneasily.

Hernandez's face had once been young and attractive: Deep blue eyes, sharp nose, strong angled jaw, a perfect sun-golden tan, silky flowing hair… But now, almost ten years later, he looked completely different. His nose was still pretty sharp, but the bags under his eyes drew away from that. His jaw had withered away, and he was starting to develop a slight double-chin. _Stupid lab fast-food, would it be that difficult to get something healthy once in a while? _He sighed. His skin had paled considerably, and even though he wasn't ghostly white, his face had drained just about all its color. It was as if the day he had stepped into the lab, a small drain had opened at the bottom of his face and as the years had passed, the color slowly dripped out. Hernandez's white skin made him look considerably older. His hair had begun to gray, but it still had a slight smoothness to it.

Hernandez looked himself straight in the eyes. That was just about the only thing that hadn't completely deserted him. They were still a wonderful shade of ocean blue, highly accented from the rest of his plain, pale face. They looked deep, knowing, sad… Hernandez sighed again. _A person isn't supposed to age this quickly._

He looked down at his clothes, under his ankle-length lab coat; he wore a plain white shirt and black pants. Plain and simple. On his feet was a pair of brown loafers.

After seeing enough of what he thought was a revolting image, Hernandez looked away and headed for the door.

Hernandez placed his hand on the keyboard and inputted the first five-digit code. One of the locks in the door withdrew into its cavity with a loud slam. Hernandez repeated the process three more times until the door was completely unlocked.

Hernandez took a few deep breaths. His mind filled with thoughts of the surgery. He had been alone, performing an incredibly dangerous and highly fatal operation. Today he would see if it had worked, if his efforts had been successful.

He reached for the door handle, hands trembling. Fingers touched cold steel. Hernandez's wrist turned. A small click was heard as the bolt withdrew into the door. He pushed.

A blast of cold air hit him full blast. Hernandez felt his body freeze up, but he felt his normal warm condition come back, and with boiling blood, he stepped inside.

The room was square, painted white just like the rest of this section of the lab. There were no windows other than the viewing port. That and the impenetrable door was the only escape for the creature inside. In the middle of it all, there was a steel bed-frame in which a fresh mattress had been comfortably seated. The creature was lying on it, chest heaving up and down as it breathed. Every limb had been tied, or rather bolted, down with steel braces that would keep it stiffly in place.

Hernandez no longer felt afraid. He approached the being, adrenaline coursing through his body.

"Hello…?" Hernandez whispered. His voice was barely audible. The creature didn't stir.

Hernandez got right to work. He approached the bed and went around to the headrest. He took his fingers and felt around in the scalp. Surprised, he felt nothing. No scars, no open wounds, no imperfections in the skin.

"Impossible," Hernandez spoke, puzzled. "The operation was two days ago, there's no way in hell he's already healed, and the stitches… Where are they?" He felt around the head some more, swearing he should have found a wound. Even more shocking, the stitches were completely gone. But still, no scratches or wounds caught his attention. Hernandez stopped probing and pulled out a notepad from an inside pocket in his lab coat.

"Day two, brain surgery wounds fully healed. Stitches nowhere in sight." Hernandez tended to dictate things to himself as he wrote them down. He finished writing and started to walk around to the chest area, but the first step he took felt strange. He had stepped on something. Hernandez lifted his foot and looked. His blood chilled at the sight.

There on the floor lay a long piece of thread. It was surgery thread, used to stitch up open wounds to help the skin's healing process. The thread on the floor was bloodied, no doubt from the scalp wound. Hernandez's blood froze over once again as he had a frightening realization.

"It's impossible for the stitches to fall off by themselves. Even after the skin has completely bonded, the thread should still be intact. Unless somehow he escaped the restraints and pried off the thread himself, there's no way they would have come off…" But Hernandez looked, and the wrists were held securely by the steel shackles.

Hernandez looked at the chest area. The stitches here were still intact, and the skin had completely bonded. Hernandez grabbed a pair of small clippers from a small table next to the bed and clipped off the threads bonding the skin. He carefully pulled the threads out, being wary that he didn't rip the skin. He picked up the thread on the floor and entangled it with the one he had just collected from the chest wound.

"Chest wound completely healed…" he scribbled on his notepad.

Hernandez walked back to the head and searched once more for a perfusion, a cut, anything to show evidence that the scalp had been cut open. But still, he felt nothing. Hernandez scratched his head. He decided his observations were complete, and he walked toward the door.

A voice came from behind him; it almost gave him a heart attack.

"Doctor…" it said.

Hernandez froze. There was no way, he was paranoid, that creature had not talked, and it was all in his imagination.

"Doctor…" it repeated.

Hernandez slowly turned. The human in the bed shifted in the bed, as if waking from a very long nap. But it didn't struggle in the shackles. It recognized them, and didn't attempt to break free. This creature was intelligent; it knew fighting the restraints would only result in pain for itself.

"Doctor… Am I alive, or is this heaven?" it asked.

Hernandez wasn't quite sure how to answer.

"You're alive, child. You survived a very deadly operation, and now you are the only human of your kind…"

The human looked down at himself, and then his gaze drifted up toward Hernandez. "What exactly did you to me, doctor?"

"You'll know soon enough, but you must rest now. You'll need all of your energy for the purpose you are about to serve." Hernandez couldn't believe he was speaking to his specimen. He shook his head, expecting to wake up from a dream. But he didn't. He headed towards the door.

He opened the door, paused, and looked back at the human. It had a longing look in its eyes. It wanted freedom; that much was obvious. Hernandez longed to set it free. But he knew the time was still premature. He exited the room and closed the door behind him.

Hernandez pressed the LOCK button on the keyboard next to the door, and four loud clangs were heard as the locks slammed into the cavities in the wall. Hernandez stopped. He dropped his head and sighed.

_Why did I agree to create this…?_

_This young man's life: I've ruined it._

_But he will be the savior of the world; his time is almost upon us._

Hernandez knew exactly why he had created this human.

He just didn't feel like facing the facts.

He had been commissioned to construct this being by an anonymous source in the White House. This unknown person claimed he had evidence of the President babbling on about some crazy New World Order and World Ruling. He kept going off about "the time being near," and "the world would be saved." The anonymous source had done his research, and had discovered several disturbing facts about the thing the President had referred to when speaking about the New World Order. He had sensed something was wrong, and wanted to make sure that if a war came down, someone would be there to save the day.

Hernandez had received the phone call. There wasn't much the caller said. He had only commissioned Hernandez to implant the boy with a special technology and had stated he had transferred a good sum of money to Hernandez's bank account as funding.

To Hernandez's surprise, the money was really there when he went to check. He had half-expected to awake from a dream. It was all real, however, all of it. But there was one daunting question… How had the source from the White House been able to find him and his bank account number? Apparently the government had eyes on the back of its head. It could find anything anywhere whenever it pleased.

There was another oddity in the whole scheme of things. The technology the source had demanded Hernandez to use was one of his own top secret projects. No one knew about it, he had told no one. No one had access to his lab but him, yet the source had somehow found out about the research on human advancement Hernandez was currently studying and developing on. The fact that the government knew about a completely secretive project scared Hernandez. _What else did they know?_

Nevertheless, Hernandez had started on the project assigned to him immediately. He had a human that had been in a coma for five years. He was eighteen today, but he had been dead since he was thirteen. The human was one of his side projects, funded by numerous hospital branches around the world. The project's initial target was to find a way of reviving patients in a static condition. But for a very long time, Hernandez had discovered no headway. After a while, he demanded from the hospitals that they stop funding immediately because the research was not making any great breakthroughs. He continued to work until they stopped, then he ended his research. He placed the coma-stricken teenager into the freezer and felt he would never open it again.

But two weeks ago, he had finally opened it once more, hoping this was the last time he would have to put the young child back inside. He ran a few studies and found the body was still intact. The coma was also very present, but gave comfort to Hernandez's heart. _At least he isn't dead._

This human would have several implants inserted into several areas of his body. The implants were part of a technology Hernandez called SuperHuman. The implants produced a special strain of adrenaline into the muscles so they could react more quickly and for longer periods of time without fatigue. The implants were also merged with the body's nerve system and delivered brain signals to the muscles faster. The result was a human with the keenest senses in the world. Reaction times were also the quickest. Quick reflexes combined with overwhelming speed and power resulted in an incredible organism; a Super-human, in a sense.

Hernandez had never tried the technology on any living being. But using muscle tendons from the bodies of people who had donated their bodies to the sciences, Hernandez had fine-tuned the system of metallic implants to the smallest detail. He had stream-lined the product, making it lightweight and almost insignificant to its owner. The nerve connections were bound tighter and tighter, and reaction times kept getting quicker. Muscle activity increased in intervals of time. As Hernandez's research kept getting more and more advanced, he designed the implants so that they put out the maximum output of energy into the muscle tendons. Every machine-like aspect of the implants had been carefully observed and redesigned numerous times just to get it right.

With this request from the anonymous source in the White House, Hernandez would finally have a plausible reason for trying out the technology. If failure occurred, Hernandez could simply blame the government and get on with his life. He then thought about it again. _Ha, there's absolutely no way I'm winning a court trial against the United States government. I don't even know who contacted me!_

Whatever the consequences, there was a task at hand. Hernandez pulled up his sleeves and got to work.

The first operation focused on the brain. Making careful incisions and cutting away chunks of skull, Hernandez opened up the brain and began the first stage of the SuperHuman implants. He installed a tiny microchip into the direct center of the brain. Hernandez then hotwired tiny wires into nerve endings in the brain; connecting one tiny wire into each nerve that led into the five main thinking stations of the human brain: The frontal lobe, temporal lobe, parietal lobe, occipital lobe, and the cerebellum. Another wire extended from the microchip and connected to the nerve endings in the spinal cord.

The microchip first gathered information from the brain.

Normally the brain observes its surroundings using the five senses, and using the main brain lobes in conjunction, it works up a plan on what to do next. The brain then shoots signals to the different muscle groups in the group to carry out the plan. The muscles receive the message from the different shootings and spikes coming from the nerves, and then act accordingly.

The microchip only enhanced this process. Instead of being processed in normal brain lobes, the information the five senses picked up was sent to the microchip for processing. The microchip worked at speeds extremely faster than the normal capability of a brain. Because of this, reaction times to dire situations would be faster and the human would be able to react faster a dangerous event and have more of a chance of getting out alive.

After the microchip was done processing the information, it immediately shot them down to the nerve systems. The nerves acted twice as quickly with the microchip controlling their signal transfers. The microchip, in a sense, supercharged the nerves and forced them to perform at much higher levels of action.

But there was a stipulation. Normal human beings are healthy to perform basic actions throughout the day without much fatigue, simply because the brain doesn't send overly confusing and adrenaline–charged commands very often. Therefore, the human body isn't rigged to perform at the extreme conditions the microchip demanded constantly. Because of this, the SuperHuman microchip would quickly fatigue the body with its large overload of constant information.

That's what the implants were there to fix.

The second, third, and fourth operations focused on sticking the implants in the optimum areas of the human body. They were mostly centered on the leg areas. Implants were placed on the thigh, calf, and shin muscles to ensure that this "SuperHuman" would have the fastest speed on the planet. Other implants were integrated into arms, abdomen, and hands. The implants were placed in between the muscle tendons, fitting smugly in the area. From the smooth metallic surface, there were randomly scattered needles which did not harm or irritate muscle in the least bit. It instead injected the adrenaline strain into the muscle, making it faster and more enduring. The implants were than fused with nerve endings normally attached to the muscle.

With these nerve endings connected, the microchip could now send lightening fast messages to the muscles in the body and the muscles now had enough speed and endurance and strength to carry out the command.

As Hernandez's research developed, he also found ways to reprogram the immune system in the body. By detecting the areas in the human body that produced immune responses, he found a way to trick the immune system into working twice as hard when an imperfection in the body was found. He also got the system to develop a different type of cell derived from a family that survived one of the deadliest crises in the history of the world.

In the 1500s, the plague had stricken Europe and effectively killed off about two-thirds of the population. Just about everyone died, simply because no one had ever seen or witnessed the plague, no one had a specific immunity to the disease. But there was one family who turned the tables. They, like any other family in Europe at the time, had contracted the disease. The plague was officially in their bodies, but they never experienced any of the symptoms of the plague, nor did they ever die from it. Some studies run about twenty years ago had proven that by collecting a few blood samples from the family's bloodline, scientists had found a slight mutation in their bodies' cell production systems.

Normal cells that are produced in the human body often have small spikes randomly jutting out of the cell. These are typically created to fend the cell off, but the plague used these spikes to their advantage. The plague virus effectively stuck to these spikes and injected its harmful material into the cell. The cell became infected, and a few hours to a few days later, the person had caught the plague.

But the surviving family had an oddity to their cell production systems. Their cells didn't have the normal spikes that just about everyone produced. Their cells were perfectly round. They were almost a perfect sphere, with absolutely no perfusions in the skin. It was believed that this family should have a higher chance of getting sick, but scientists found that the truth was the exact opposite. The plague, having no areas to cling to, simply stuck to the cell. The virus was inside the body, but it just had no way of getting into the body's cells. After a while, the plague just died off. A lot of similar viruses and bacteria couldn't attack the family's cells for the same reason. There was just no way to get inside a cell to destroy it. Hernandez ran some studies and worked on a method of getting his specimen to produce these cells on his own.

Hernandez genetically engineered blood cells to receive this same mutation, and implemented these new cells into the new immune system he had placed into the Superhuman. The new cells weren't one-hundred percent immune to every disease in the world, but they protected against the most powerful viruses.

Even without the major protection also implemented into weaker viruses, the lightning fast immune system allowed the body to rid itself of minor diseases fairly quickly. A minor common cold, for example, would be fought off in just a half-hour. Any major disease like cancer could be fought off in just five days. Ebola, one of the most dangerous viruses in the entire world, could be out of the body in about ten days, and the human would suffer from only the most minor symptoms.

Of course, there was a stipulation in the immunity system acting towards outside imperfections. Yes, it could quickly heal any of them, but the fatality rate of any pain inflicted upon the body was the same as any other human. For example, the superhuman had just enough chance of dying from a shotgun blast as a normal human being. But if the superhuman managed to survive from any type of attack, his wounds would heal dramatically faster than the normal human.

The only problem Hernandez couldn't seem to solve was the one of lifting the coma. He had tried stimulating several areas of the brain, quickening and slowing the heart rate, jump-starting the heart… The list went on, but nothing had ever worked. Hernandez had just about given up until today.

Today Hernandez had spoken to the boy. The boy was perfectly alive now.

Hernandez stepped through the airlock, repeated the cleaning process, and stepped out again. _The boy is alive…_ _I must warn the government man…_ Hernandez walked quickly to his lab. He was currently in a dark corridor, also painted white. But here the lights were considerably dim, small lights covered up by triangular prism-like shades had been screwed and bolted to the wall. The floor here was made of hard steel, making a clunking noise as Hernandez took each step. The walls were inset with several doors. Each one had a small plaque announcing the rooms inside: _Examination Lab, MRI, Operational Room, Incubation Room, _and so on. All of these rooms belonged to Hernandez, and no one else was allowed to come down here into his research without his consent.

Hernandez stopped in the middle of the hallway and fished in his pockets for a small piece of crumpled up paper. He found it in his left pants pocket and carefully pulled it out. The paper was weeks old, and it was no doubt withered to a dangerous point where it could rip easily. Some words and a few numbers had been scribbled onto it with a blue ballpoint pen.

Call Anonymous

981-784-9082

First Extension: 458

Second Extension: 9127

Hernandez took his phone from his pocket. He opened it… But then he closed it again. Calls were often traced by the lab's upper echelon to avoid suspicious activity inside the labs. He couldn't use his lab's telephones, and pay phones near here were mostly likely wired back to the lab. His best option was to use a cell phone. He opened the phone once more and typed in the cell phone number.

Beeeeep…Beeeeep…Beeeeep

A robotic male voice declared, "Please enter First Extension." Hernandez did, _458._

More beeps. After a few seconds, the male voice once again spoke, "Please enter Second Extension." _9127._

…

"Please wait while your White House representative comes to the phone." A jazz tune was played as waiting music, not helping at all to calm Hernandez's nerves. Unexpectedly, the music abruptly stopped, and a gruff voice at the other end spoke.

"Dr. Hernandez," it said.

_Hmm, a little quick to judge, don't you think? _Hernandez thought. "Yeah, it's me."

"I have been expecting your call. What news do you offer me?"

"All technologies have been installed, the superhuman is officially ready."

"Excellent. What of the status on the coma?"

"Actually, that's exactly why I phoned you. I wasn't able to detect when, but the coma has lifted. In fact, the human _spoke _today. His speech was fluent. He recognized who, or at least, _what _I was."

"Do you have any idea how it could have gone away? Or what triggered the lifting?"

"No idea. I had been studying that very idea on a side-project a few months ago. But I never got any very extreme breakthroughs, so I just gave up on the project. I don't have enough knowledge on the subject to give a definite answer."

"Hmm… Well, the fact that he is alive and well is good for our progress. But there is something you must do to the human. Unless you plan to restrain him for the next few days, you have to put him on a full body anesthetic for exactly eighty-four hours. Make the anesthesia as strong as possible; he must register as almost not having a heartbeat. Start now, and make sure you finish by twelve-o-clock P.M. The anesthetics must be in his body by that time.

"Once you're done, pack up your things, quit your job, grab up all the money in your savings accounts and enjoy your life for the next three days."

Hernandez was stricken with surprise, "Wait, what?! What do you mean?"

The voice on the other side seemingly paid no attention to Hernandez's question. "Make sure the human can get out of the building safely and effectively. After the anesthetics have hit him full force, relieve him of his restraints, open any doors that may be under lock, and give him a safe way out.

"I have also delivered a small device to your very location; you should find it in your dormitory in about fifteen minutes. Take the device and screw it to the roof directly above the human."

"What is it?"

"It is only for him to find out."

"Ok, I'll make sure all of that gets done."

"Thank you Dr. Hernandez. Trust me, one day the world will thank you for this deed. You are among the saviors of the New World Order. Thank you."

The phone went dead.

Hernandez checked his watch. 7:58 A.M.

"What the hell did he mean by 'enjoy your life for the next three days'?" Hernandez rubbed his temples and remembered something else the anonymous source had said. _Start now, and make sure you finish by twelve-o-clock P.M. The anesthetics must be in his body by that time._

Hernandez had exactly four hours and two minutes to finish the job. He didn't bother questioning the source, besides, he was eager to activate the superhuman. Hernandez realized that three full days of rest would more than enough for recuperation.

Hernandez headed down the corridor and walked into a room. The plaque beside it read, _Medical Substances._

One of the last things the source had said still rattled through Hernandez's mind as he shut the door behind him.

_You are among the saviors of the New World Order. Thank you._

Hernandez smiled, "This guy's probably paranoid. As if the world is really going to end. What a lie."

Hernandez had no idea how wrong he was.


	2. Chapter 2

2

_I could hear footsteps. In fact, those very footsteps were the first sound I had heard in quite a while. I listened to the lazy flopping of those footsteps and savored them. My hearing wasn't very acute; the steps sounded muffled and far. But I knew I had better listen now because after this, I would probably go back into death._

_Death was a strange place for me. It seemed that I had been there multiple times. It wasn't a hellish world filled with burning pits and screaming souls or a heavenly place filled with happy beings and winged angels. It was more of a dark room where you could sleep for eternity without being disturbed. The guardian of this room would stop me at the entrance and relieve me of my five senses then help me over to a bed lying in the darkness. He would help me down into the soft mattress. Cushioned by the soft object beneath me, I would close my eyes. Sometimes I would close them unwillingly, battling to stay awake to explore the world I had just encountered for such a short time, desperate to know what occurs in the world around my prison. But every effort to stay awake was as futile as the last. Deprived of rest, or locked into a circle of incarceration, I would always close my eyes and sleep, forever it seemed, only to once again wake up and hear something of the outside world._

_But I felt something strange today as I listened to shuffling steps. Something unique, something I had never felt before._

_I felt alive._

_I cannot explain. All the other encounters with the outside world had been very restricting. A few sounds here and there, maybe the touch of another object. But today, it seemed as if I could open my eyes then and there and once again become a part of the world I had always desired to know. But I didn't know how to open my eyes._

_I felt a cold chill run down my body as I noticed my ill fate. Now that I could see, I would never learn how. I noticed hearing was very automatic, sound is entered into your ears, you don't have to take action to listen. _

_Then I noticed. I had felt the cold chill. I had felt it everywhere it had traveled. It was there. My bloodstream seemed to be regaining strength. All of a sudden, I felt something else._

_Fingers grazed against my scalp. I yearned to yell out to let that person or thing know I was alive. But I couldn't. I had no control of my body. A perfectly living mind inside a useless and futile body, that's what I was. I heard footsteps once more. They were getting clearer; that was for sure. The muffled scuffle of feet against floor had turned into clear shuffles. I felt fingers graze my chest._

_I could feel my body slowly start to come around. I could feel my eyes well within reach. I knew how to open them, but the time hadn't come just yet. My mind fought a hard fight to restore all connections to my limbs. Meanwhile I listened some more._

_A scratching sound, some speech, more scratching, footsteps. This was definitely a human. What was going on? If I did manage to open my eyes today, what would I find? It was hard to imagine, I hadn't had a real view of the world in a very long time, I didn't know what to expect. My mind tensed. I wasn't sure I was ready for the big moment._

_I heard the footsteps fading away; they seemed to turn to murmurs. No!!! This couldn't be happening! I was so very close to waking up this time. I begged my body to respond, I needed to awake today. The footsteps were getting quieter. Then out of nowhere they stopped. I realized my time was over. It was once again time to fall into a deep slumber. But something happened that destroyed those thoughts._

I saw a flash of white. My eyes had whipped open and now I could see. But other than the wall of white light before me, I couldn't see anything else. My eyeballs rolled quickly in my eye sockets, trying to take in all they could in case my body decided to fall asleep once again.

At first glance, I could see I was in a small white room, square in shape. Some equipment I had never seen surrounded me. I looked down at myself. I was stripped bare of any clothes other than some white boxers. I could see a large line of dots running diagonally down across my chest. It looked like I had been ripped open in that very spot and sewn back together frantically. I looked up and saw him. I had to communicate. I tried speaking.

"Doctor…" I said; it was the only thing I could manage before gasping for air. Throughout my observation of the room, I had completely forgotten to breathe.

The man jumped. He slowly turned towards me, a horrified expression covering his face. His blue eyes were widened, his eyebrows were raised, and his mouth was slightly open as in disbelief. If I was surprised that I had woken up today, the man in front of me was surprised tenfold. He showed no signs of responding, so I spoke again, wishing I could hear the true sound of a human voice at last.

"Doctor…"

I got a similar response: Silence. I tried to move my arms. I knew I could, but for some reason I couldn't move them in their full range of motion. I looked down.

To my dismay, every one of my limbs had been shackled down to the bed I was laying in with heavy metal chains. I didn't bother struggling against them. I knew from the cartoons that I had watched when I was very small that only Superman could break free of chains like this. I looked at the man standing by the door. He was still looking at me with a sense of awe. Why wasn't he speaking? Then I had another terrible realization. What if I'm not alive? What if I've finally slept for too long and passed on?

I addressed my concerns to the doctor. I was relieved when he finally responded.

"You're alive, child. You survived a very deadly operation, and now you are the only human of your kind…"

I looked down and looked at the scar tearing across my chest.

"What exactly did you to me, doctor?"

The man had a troubled expression on his young but old face. He seemed to be contemplating something. "You'll know soon enough," the man managed. "But you must rest now. You'll need all of your energy for the purpose you are about to serve."

The man opened the door and closed it behind him. I was alone.

I looked at the metal shackles holding my wrists and ankles to the bed. I knew struggling would do no good, so I just laid back and looked at the ceiling. I wanted to rest. Even though I had slept for an eternity, I felt exhausted. But closing my eyes was the last thing I wanted to do right now. I was much too afraid. I felt that if I ever closed my eyes and tried to sleep again, I would fall right back into the circle of death I had lived in not so long ago.

My eyelids felt heavy. I let them fall over my eyes. I waited a second or two; then flashed them back open. I just wanted to make sure I was still alive. Apparently I was. I let the lids of my eyes once again fall into their resting places and let them lay there. Angelic music seemed to fill my head and in mere seconds, _I was asleep._

…

…

…

…

…

I felt a tiny prick in my arm. I stirred. Something seemed to be bothering my arm. I opened my eyes, relieved to see I was still in the white room. It was a boring place to be, but at least I was alive. My vision was a little bit blurry, but I could fairly make out someone standing next to my bed. It was the same man who I had met only…

God, when was that? I was completely disoriented in this room. There was no clock, and the sun was nowhere to be found. I didn't know what was up and what was down.

I looked at the man. As my vision cleared, I was horrified to see what he done. Three needles had been jabbed into the veins in both of my arms. They were attached to tubes, which I followed with my eyes. They traveled up to a large bag labeled, "Anesthetics." Was that much anesthetic even safe?

"Doctor, are you doing?" I exclaimed. I tried moving, but I could feel the drugs taking effect. I felt almost no connection to my arms, and a flash of cold zipped through my body as I started to feel what I had hoped would never happen again.

I was slipping back into death.

I cried out, I begged the doctor to please stop. The look on his face was the saddest thing I had ever seen. He looked as if he was doing this against his will. It was strange, I felt sorry for him, but quite frankly he was trying to put me back in a coma. My vision blurred, I began to feel very tired.

"Please…Stop…the……drugs………" I managed, my voice slowly losing tone and annunciation. I put my head on the pillow under me and tried to take control of my limbs, but nothing would work. I felt death creeping up over me. I could feel him smiling. How could I believe I was actually alive? It was all a big…_joke……………_

My eyeballs rolled around desperately in their sockets. I took one last look at the doctor. My vision was scrambled and came in short bursts, but I could manage to see what was happening well enough.

The Doctor was at the door looking at me, halfway out the door. There was a suitcase in one of his hands that seemed to be brimming with items. His other hand was rested on the jamb of the door. He dropped his head and his mouth moved. Then he looked at me one final time and said…

"Good luck, Adam."

Then he exited the room and closed the door behind him. That was the last thing I -----

…

…

…

…

…

…

…

.:-----------------------------------:.

Hades sat down in his metal chair and placed his arms on the table. The table was elliptical, and constructed, or rather, carved out from a block of brushed steel, about five feet wide and about fifteen long. It was very large, and very heavy. Everyone who ever sat down at this table trusted the triangular braced metal structure underneath to prevent the table to fall down and crush their legs. Hades knew it was perfectly safe. Some of the best engineers in the world had been hired to build the entire complex and paid mass sums to ensure the building was the most secret, undetectable, and sturdy it could be. Hades couldn't lie; they had done quite a tremendous job. Just like this table, most of everything in the building was constructed of solid metal, any type of technologies concealed under about five inches thick of the steel.

Hades looked at two small reflecting points on the table. On its two foci were small holes drilled into the steel, about five inches deep. They were covered by small panes of circular cuts of glass, and under these, two small projectors were concealed. They used knew technologies that shot special forms of bended and distorted light into the air. The two projectors combined the images they were generating in mid-air and created something of a simple hologram.

It was crude technology, and had only been recently released by scientists working in the complex. The images it produced were mostly one sided and only two-dimensional, but it was completely rigged so that the image could be controlled by human touch. It was much like handling the touch-screen capability of a screen, but applying the technology to an image floating in mid-air. It worked by using a small camera hooked to roof and pointed directly down at any currently projecting image. When someone or something touched an item on the hologram, the camera gathered the XYZ coordinate information and sent it down to a large computer sitting underneath the floor the table was located. The computer studied the feedback the camera was collecting and responsively moved articles on the hologram as they were intended to. It was a very simple technology, used today in many aspects, such as projected calculators in schools.

Hades looked into the image the projectors were generating. The left-hand side of the image was a picture of the President of the United States. It was an image that had been taken from the internet and showed the man at his Inauguration, addressing the multitudes before him. His face was serene, powerful. It seemed the country had picked the right man for the job. He seemed to always be calm under heated pressure.

Hades smiled, "Ha ha, it's ironic, because he's having a mental breakdown now. The world doesn't realize that anyone, no matter how powerful, can be taken down with a few simple words."

To the right of the picture of the President was a series of numbers arranged like the buttons on a telephone. An eleven-digit phone number had already been input into the system, and above the numbers, the word _Dialing _faded in and out of the projection.

A dial tone surrounded Hades, being transmitted from a package of Bose Acoustimass Series II speakers. It made even the simple beeps of a dial tone have depth to the sound they created. Hades liked to think of himself of an intricate man, and he preferred to have even the tiniest details revealed to him.

The phone rang once, twice, three times.

Then, Hades finally heard what he had been waiting for.

"Hello?" the voice on the other side seemed frightened, jittery. It sounded afraid, like a small child realizing he got caught for failing a test, and expecting the doom that waits.

Hades responded with a cool and calm voice, "Hello, Mr. President. How are you?"

"Well, uh…, you know; the same-old, same-old."

"Really? Mr. President, if you don't mind my saying so, you don't seem to very enthusiastic about your job. Is the duty of being President not as great as it's cut out to be? Because you sure don't seem to be very happy about it…"

The President paused, then he cleared his throat and began speaking again. "No, no, it's a great task. It's a very large responsibility. I enjoy the job very much, it's just…"

"Is it the fact that I seem to be terrorizing your country right now?"

The President seemed to utter a small and forced chuckle, "Ha ha, yes, that is part of it."

"Well, Mr. President, I thought we had moved past this fear a long time ago? Didn't I explain the entire process to you? As long as you keep your side of the bargain, not a single human will be hurt."

"Yes, I understand."

Hades produced a small laugh. "It's these moments that sort of make you regret taking this job, right? What the hell possesses people to take a job like this anyway?"

"Sometimes even I don't understand." The President's voice gained just a smidge of confidence. Hades understood: the President was trying to veer away from the ill-fated conversation they were supposed to be having. Hades easily noted the President slowly coming up for air and brought him right back down.

"Whatever, let's discuss the matter at hand--" Hades thought he heard a whimper at the other side of the call. _Good, _he thought. "You do realize the time is almost upon us, to… you know, _press the button._" Hades continued.

"Y-yes, that's right." The President went back to his old jittery self.

Hades let a bit of frustration and lack of patience enter his voice, "Mr. President, you don't seem very sure of yourself. Are you having regrets?"

"No, it's just-"

"Mr. President, let me remind you that this is an unstoppable event. You and I agreed on all the compromises necessary to make this event possible. I have kept all of my promises, now it is time for you to come through with your part."

"Yes, I realize…"

"And, I'm sure you already know, but if you do not comply with you half of the bargain, we _will _take matters into our own hands. If you do not trigger the event in your country, we will, and things will get very complicated in the United States."

"Yes, yes, I understand. Don't worry, I will follow through."

Hades relaxed his voice once more, laughing inside his own mind. "Thank you, Mr. President. I realize you have doubts, but we trust you to help us in our mission. The New World Order is upon us, and when the world once again becomes cleansed, the world will look to you and thank you. Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. President, and with that, I must leave you."

Hades pressed a button on the projected image before him. _End Call,_ and the call was lost.

.:-----------------------------------:.

…

…

…

The world was silenced for thirty minutes. All was quiet, but minds were tearing; Human minds. One second, the world was bustling and sleeping, working and resting, watching and listening, and the next, everyone stopped. Humans suddenly stopped what they were doing and stood up straight. Their eyes reset to a static position, their arms hung limp at their sides, their faces straightened. All seemed serene and peaceful in a terribly odd way, but inside the minds of every human affected, chaos and terror raged.

The human consciousness was the only thing they still had control of, as if suddenly, they had been withdrawn to a part of their body where they no longer had any connections to their bodies. Human minds could still think, they could still process information as well as they could before, but they no longer had any control over their bodies. Every person in the world was suddenly disconnected. Everyone was a prisoner inside their own body.

And even then, among all the struggling to break free from this strange spell, there was a voice: A woman's voice. It was peaceful, it was inviting, and it urged all congregations to listen. This is what it said:

_Do not be alarmed, citizens of Earth. This is only a minor step required for the new Earth 2.0. Today we will strive to bring you a new era, one of peace and justice, but there are some necessary precautions that must be taken to ensure that our efforts are as effective as possible. And for that to occur, human beings must cease to run under their own will power for a few years as we cleanse the world from all the wrong you have polluted it with. The world has always been in a state of peril. Wars rage, religious conflicts bustle, global warming destroys the health of our beautiful planet, and pollution ruins the state of our atmospheres. And all this is the effect of the irresponsibility of the human._

_The world was once a peaceful place. In the Holy Bible, Genesis tells about the Garden of Eden, a wondrous place filled with all the absolutely necessary things humans need to daily survive in comfort. Adam and Eve were the first conscious beings to be placed here. They lived well for a time, until Eve was confronted by the Serpent. The Serpent being Satan's vessel for destruction. Eve defied God's adherence to stay away from the fruits of the Serpent, and she and Adam rejoiced in the poisoned fruit. God banished them from the Garden of Eden forever, and forced them to become independent of themselves._

_Adam and Eve, in a sense, ruined it for all of us. Imagine a world where they didn't make this mistake. Imagine if they hadn't taken the fruit, we'd all be in our own Garden of Eden right now. _

_But no, this one sin, this one mistake, this one moment of blindness ruined the future for everyone. So, why did God give humans free will? Why did God entrust creatures such as humans with Earth? All they bring about the world is Chaos and Confusion. _

_Look at you all. To make your lives easier, you create machines that pollute the Earth, you dump pollutants where you will, and you destroy each other for pieces of land, when there is enough to go around if you would all just all cooperate and keep your peace. You all deny people equal rights because of ethnic or religious background, and you will kill all those that will not agree with you._

_This planet has been corrupted beyond belief. Humans have destroyed and wronged it on many levels. You have rejoiced over violence since the beginning of time. If blood isn't pouring, there isn't enough violence. You are entertained by killing your own kind; it's in your TV shows, your movies, and your video games, everywhere. Bloodthirsty monsters you are._

_So it's time for change: Change that has been happening for hundreds of years already. We've brainwashed world leaders numerous times throughout history into joining our cause, into the New World Order. But there was a compromise. _

_We couldn't wipe two-thirds of the population, as was originally intended. World leaders knew there was still hope for you all._

_We strongly disagreed, but the compromise had to be made._

_World leaders urged us to wait a bit longer; they said humanity would pull through. They said there was good in humans, they said you would all change at one point or another, that one day, all wars would stop and the world would rejoice in peace. _

The woman's voice became harsh.

_But let us enlighten you._ _Peace does NOT exist. It never has, it never will. Peace is just a dream, a hopeless dream that isn't worth imagining, simply because peace is untouchable. Every time the world comes a little closer to uniting, someone has to step up and ruin things for everyone. Wars once again begin, and we're right back where we started, angrier and more bloodthirsty than ever._

_We realized you would not make the change yourselves, so we had to take matters into our own hands. You have brought your own demise upon yourselves. But don't take it as demise, think of it as a rebirth, as a good thing. We will keep you under this robotic condition for the benefit of everyone. You will do everything you are commanded to do, you will respond to no one else, and any mind refusing our commands will be brutally exterminated._

The woman's voice went back to its kind and peaceful tone.

_It's will all be alright in the end. Trust us, our process is foolproof, and as long as no one decides to rebel, we will be kind to you._

_And with that, I leave you. Cleansing of the world begins in twenty minutes. Please restrict from fighting the spell. There is no way to withdraw from our influence. Simply relax, and let Cleansing begin. Earth 2.0 is something you want, trust us._

.:-----------------------------------:.

The message was run through every human's brain. In the brain, the message was deciphered by a part of the brain used to detect and use languages. The message was decrypted, and the message was heard in a subconscious state by the human mind. Around the planet, minds heard the message and began withdrawing from fighting the strange spell. Others kept fighting the futile war, but there was nothing they could do to win.

.:-----------------------------------:.

The Cleanser Base was located in a hidden area that had been in the process of building for more than two-hundred years. Hidden deep in the Amazon, the Cleanser Base was inhabited with only two-hundred men and women, twenty of them great world leaders. Their names had never been written down anywhere, they had never mentioned their names to anyone else in the Base. They all went by codenames: Codenames not to be used anywhere but inside the Base.

The chief operator of the Cleansing was Hades. Hades was, of course, a codename. His cloudy green eyes were focused on the screen before him. The size of two cinema screens put together, the screen provided him with an extremely in-depth look at particular stages of the Cleansing.

The majority and center of the screen displayed a world map. Stretched out before him, the map was littered with billions and billions of dots. Each dot represented a human being and all human beings in the world were currently being transmitted on Hades' screen. Dead humans were the only exception, and they had been excluded from the display.

Everyone else was there and their dots told Hades what status of Collection they were in. Yellow signified a rebellious mind, one that had not yet given into the voice of the Cleansing. Green dots had already succumbed to the Cleansing and were ready for Extraction. At the corner of the map, there was a percentage displaying how much of Earth's population was ready for Extraction. So far, 85% was ready, and the number was slowly climbing.

Hades heard someone approach him. Stiletto heels clicked on the marble floor. It was Murai, the female chief operator.

"How goes the Collection?" she asked. Hades looked at her. She was wearing a black leather jacket and jeans. On her feet were the black stilettos whose clicking annoyed Hades to hell. Her hair was let loose and covered Hades' view of her face. It was long, black and silky, reaching down to about her elbows. Hades turned back to the screen

"Look at the numbers, 87% done," Hades replied annoyingly. He hated questions that had answers in plain sight.

"Hmm, persistent little animals aren't they?"

Hades nodded, "Humans have a tendency to fight for their lives. Freedom is one thing they'll refuse to give up until the last drop of blood has bled from their bodies."

"Hmm, well, if there are any rebels still fighting in five minutes, we shall terminate them, correct?"

"Yes, there's not enough time to wait until all of their spirits weaken. Its fine, a few hundred million losses won't bring terrible trouble to the Cleansing."

"Of course not."

Murai looked at the percentage. "93%, we're almost there."

"Soon the world will begin cleaning up the mess it created, the Cleansing is imminent."

Murai gave him a slight smile. She turned and walked out the door, black stilettos clicking.

All around the world, people were starting to fall back. The ones who had fought were weakening, their minds wouldn't hold out the spell for much longer. And if they did, death awaited them in the most brutal way.

"98%" Hades observed. He felt a swell of pride sweep over his entire body. Finally, after 200 hundred years of careful planning and deception, his grandfather's legacy was about to come true.

99%

There was still some who fought. Hades looked down. Before him, on a metallic pedestal, was a small button enclosed in a glass covering. Could he wait and see if the entire world bowed down to his command? Or was it already too late? He wasn't afraid of executing the rebellious minds, and he was considering the idea heavily. Hades opened the glass cover.

His finger grazed the button.

He pressed.

.:-----------------------------------:.

A young girl was held in the back of her head like all the other humans on Earth. She was a fighter though, and she knew that no matter how tough the spell got, she would not give in. She was, after all, winning the war against cancer. How hard could it be to hold off a minor mind restriction?

Not hard at all, actually. The signal invading the mind of every human on Earth was coming from radars and satellites both on Earth and in Space. It was extremely high frequency, bordering on the threshold of pain and the inability to hear it at all. But if the victim controlled their mind, they could partially block out the sound.

The girl had been able to support it for 29 minutes. Her efforts, unfortunately, would not be rewarded. As Hades' clock struck 30 minutes into the Collection, the little girl felt a burning in her thoughts. She wouldn't have been able to feel it anywhere else. Her brain was being fried. The last thing she saw was a burning white light, and she died.

.:-----------------------------------:.

"100% COMPLETE, COLLECTION IS COMPLETE." A speaker announced.

Hades smiled, "Excellent."

But then something strange happened.

"ERROR: MALFUNCTION IN UNITED STATES UNIT. 99% COMPLETE. RUNNING FULL DIAGNOSTIC."

On Hades' map, three red dots had appeared in the United States. They stood out like sore thumbs, among the sea of green representing humans ready for Extraction. It was strange though, if a malfunction was to be reported, Hades would have thought that escapees would have been in the same general area. But that wasn't the case here. They were scattered. One was in California, another in New York, and the last in Texas.

"What the hell?" Hades yelled to himself.

"ERROR: HUMANS ESCAPING THE COLLECTION. HUMANS HAVE BEEN LOST. COMMUNICATIONS LOST."

The red dots disappeared. They didn't turn yellow, they didn't turn green. They just disappeared.

Someone had escaped the spell. And now, their positions had been erased from The Cleansing Base's computers in order to escape an error. Hades' jaw dropped. One escapee was OK; he could easily be spotted among the rest of the Collected, but three?!

"This is not good. If they band together, things could become very difficult," Hades said to himself.

Murai ran into the room, hearing the speaker and Hades. She caught her breath and looked at the screen.

"What's going on, what's wrong?"

The speaker began talking again.

"COLLECTION 100% COMPLETE. CONFIRM EXTRACTION."

Hades ignored Murai's inquiries and pulled a small Palm device from his pocket. The screen had been unlocked and was now signaling two buttons. Yes and No.

Hades pressed yes.

But he knew there was a stipulation. There were three humans out there, they had complete free will, and they could rebel.

Hades knew they would.

_I better just keep this to myself… _he thought.

Earth 2.0 was in danger.


End file.
